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Comment by Desacrasa

Comment by Theonejoe

Comment by GokuuSon

The real question is... will this be able to stack with a crusader enchant for a total of 200 Strength if the two happen to proc at the same time.

Comment by deathbywow

So how does this work? If you have the earlier version you can just upgrade?

Comment by Defiler

To make Lionheart Executioner you have to be Master Swordsmith. Reagents are:1x Lionheart Champion20x Nether Vortex

Comment by I3rawler

The question is: this Lionheart or Stormherald/Deep Thunder?

Comment by Deak

Creating this one is a long process... Nether Vortex's are rumored only to drop in 25.man instances

Comment by soddi

The weapon speed thing everyone discuss about is outdated. Many months ago, every instant attack got "weapon dmg + weapon speed * attack power bonus". So a slow weapon gave you MUCH more benefit from your AP.

But this was patched. For a long time we get 3.3 * AP on every instant attack. No weapon speed modifier anymore.

Now, a solid min/max dmg + good stats are much more important than wearing the slowest weapon in the game. Sure, slower weapons have higher max. damage than faster weapons with the same dps. But 20 max. dmg more are much less important, than you maybe think about. And don't forget, +5% chance for an extra attack is more valuable with high end equip, than +5% crit.

Comment by Napomlikethebomb

i agree with Kasotai who needs crit when you can hit people for as much as a crit without taking in resilience factor also as an arms warrior this would make MS and heroic strike deadly YAY ME

Comment by jafar

Can Crits miss or not?

The only real source for answer of this question is this Blizzard post. There exist two ways to interprete it.

One school ("Crits can miss") claims that the half-sentence "if you have a 5% crit rate, that 5% chance includes misses" means that a crit can be a miss, so if you have a 10% crit chance, and 5% miss chance, only 8 swings out of 100 will crit in the average. This means that each swing can be either a hit or a miss, and crits are calculated completely independently.

The other school ("Three outcomes") claims that the mathematical formulas given later in the post make clear that crits may never miss, and that a swing can have exactly one of three outcomes - crit, hit or miss. The probability for each of these three is calculated separate, the only restriction is that their sum has to be 100%.

Argument for Crits may missThere are many crit modifying spells within the game which can miss (such as Cold Blood).

A way to confirm or deny this, would be to let a rogue with 300 dagger skill, no +% talents or effects, use only auto-attack on a (preferrably healing-class) player with no +def for about an hour or longer. Record his crit per swing, and compare that to the crit chance displayed in his tooltip. It is however crucial that the mod/program/whatever which is recording, only recordes crit per swing and not crit per hit. So it would have to count swings, and count crits, and then divide the first by the later. Then redo the entire thing with, respectively, more %hit and more %crit.

Argument for three outcomesThe counter-argument to the "cold blood may miss" argument is that you may never increase your crit chance at the cost of your miss chance, i.e. if you have a 5% miss chance, you crit chance cannot increase beyond 95%. Using cold blood only guarntees that you will never see a normal hit, it does nothing to your miss chance.

Interpreting the blizzard post with the following steps:

"The crit rate includes misses" is a contradiction to the assumption that crits, hits and misses are the three possible, separate outcomes of a swing. Replacing "misses" by "swings that do not hit" yields: "The crit rate includes swings that do not hit". This version of the sentence matches the formulas This rather formal way of interpretation assumes a little slip in the natural language used by Blizzard. If there are three different outcomes, replacing "miss" with "not a hit" is mathematically a severe error. In natual language though it's only a slight imprecision. In other words, Blizzard uses the term "miss" a little loose, they mean it to include all swings which are not normal hits.

When Sword and Poleaxe specialization are compared alone, they are essentially the same. Both provide an additional 5% chance to do double damage, whether in a second swing or a crit. However, when considered with any preexisting crit chance, sword specialization has the added ability to crit on either hit, and also has the very small chance of a third swing, etc. Talents such as impale and deep wounds make poleaxe specialization more favorable because they can improve the damage of critical strikes. +Damage abilities also favor +crit chance because the +dmg is also doubled during a crit. Target hit and crit resistances, as well as abilities triggered by critical strikes (blood craze and enrage) should also be taken into account. Although sword spec gives the potential for higher burst damage, this situation is rare.

Comment by NeoBlackheart

This is going to be hard to do but I am going to craft both this and the Blazefury for my Prot. Paladin. This when I am not the tank and the Blazefury for when I am. It will be hard but oh well.

Comment by Beliar

sword procs can miss/parry/ be dodged, and then your 5% proc is now garbage. Where as if you have crit spec, if it is missed/parry/dodged it was going to be anyway and you missed nothing.

However, double paladin, double warrior, and a elemental shaman arena teams with the warriors having stormherald/mace spec is the most overpowered thing in the game atm, so I'd recommend that over the other specs if you're a warrior at the time of this post if you're PvP oriented.

Comment by Amathercy

For enchants I would go with Mongoose over Crusader, Mongoose will cost you a lot more but it far better imo. Gives you 120 Agility and a minor weapon speed increase. And it's a BC Enchant so it doesn't recieve the lvl 60-70 deminish. Also a question, If you enchanct the Lionheart Blade does the enchant stay with the weapon or is it destroyed? I'm assuming that It won't stay but just curious.

Comment by Amathercy

This weapon currently has the most dps other then wands and GM weapons. Even though it beats the other tier 3 weapons by like 0.1 - 0.3. But still I think it has the best graphic and the Stormherald is close next to the Bloodmoon.

Comment by Aowolf

RIght now a heavily arena/PvP geared player can have 5% reduced crit change and and around 10% dmg from resilience. This kind of gear becomes more common every day as arena teams build up more and more points. I think we will see a greater acceptation of sword spec from pvp warriors.

Comment by Amathercy

The complete mats for the Lionheart Blade,Champion and Executioner are:

1. 10 Primal Might’s (Mats Listed Below)

2. 10 Primal Mana (100 motes)*Can me farmed in Netherstorm off of Mageslayer's and Mana Wraith's*. You can also use an Engineering Item (305 Req) to Extract gas (http://www.wowhead.com/?item=23821)

3. 10 Primal Earth (100 motes)*Can be mined from Fel Iron Deposits, Khorium Veins, Adamantite Deposit and Rich Adamantite Deposit. Can also be farmed from Earth Elementals in Nagrand (All around Oshu'Gun) and Shadowmoon Valley (All around the Hand of Guldan)

4. 10 Primal Water (100 motes)*Farmed from Water elementals found in Nagrand (Kind of under Halla), Terrokar Forest and Zangramarsh. Can also be fished in Nagrand, Terrokar Forest and Zangramarsh

5. 10 Primal Air (100 motes)*Can be farmed off Air Elementals in Nagrand (Around 67,24 lvl 70-71), Shadowmoon Valley (North and South of the Black Temple)

Comment by elfiend

Nether Vortex will be easy to get? I'm really confusing. Is every crafters in the team could get one or more from the Boss or just one or more Vortex and need the leader to hand out them?

Comment by carstone

Nether Vortex will drop from trash in TK in 2.1you need 5 for this sword

Comment by Tiffa

Swordspec get fixed in Patch 2.1:

"- Sword Specialization: This ability now grants extra yellow attacks instead of extra white attacks. It also grants rage based on the speed of your weapon. This change will make Sword Specialization no longer reset the weapon swing timer when it triggers off special attacks, and results in a net increase in damage dealt. "

I can confirm this: Impale works now with Swordspec, it cannot glance and generate Rage. Procchance is round about ~5%.

Comment by edarios

Does the fear resist stack with talents like the paladins' Unyielding Faith? (10% fear resist)

Comment by relaa

ok back up 2 what they where saying earlier about a crit missing, it doesnt miss, if it missed it wasnt a crit for that reason and that u cannot miss a crit if u want me 2 back it up i will

Comment by ketsueki

im amazed nobody mentioned how good this would be on an orc warrior even over the Axe with the talent iron will plus the racial 15% you hit roughly 38% stun and charm resist with this.

Comment by biohazrd

Personally, I would not craft this weapon (Or go Master Swordsmith, for that matter) as a Warrior. Sword Specialization is great, but the weapon itself isn't that good. It has no stamina (which is vital for PvP and arena), compared to the mace (+61 stam), and wasted item points on a fear resist (which the class does not need).

I can't comment on this for Retribution Paladins or 2h Shamans, but it seems to be the weakest of the Blacksmithing weapons.

Comment by Fruitbat

Gonna craft this for my retri pala, i use sob over soc so the loss of stun isnt that great, id rather take 100 str chance any day. Would prefer some stamina over the fear resist tho.

Comment by MajorWes

Honestly I think they need to bring it down to just 1 Nether Vortex required ( and the Champion ofcoarse ).

On my server ( Ysera ) nobody for Horde has wielded this sword yet, in 25 man raids with almost all profesions wanting a vortex for their epic whatever, it makes it very unlikely to be able to obtain 5.

I have no hope of ever getting this sword as of now, even in my well raiding guild. When I obtain the Champion I plan on getting my super enchants on it.

-Wes

Comment by Lsm007

The Screenshot for this Sword is the Champion version NOT the Executioner

The tier 3 of this sword has an golden glow to it and it is also wider or well...more of an edge to it

Comment by glemmstengal

As of patch 2.2, the Lionheart series of blades which have the strength proc will now play a unique sound upon proccing. Rumor has it the sound is that of a lion's roar.

Comment by Ansi

As of patch 2.2, the Lionheart proc (http://www.wowhead.com/?spell=34513) plays the same sound you hear when Crusader proc's, and it triggers a small red "boiling" swirl above your head for the entire duration.

Comment by Shin

Compared to Lionheart Champion

+3% to resist fear+3 str+36 top end damageSlightly higher proc rate from the buff "Lionheart" (+100str)

Comment by Mooo

In fact, Lionheart Champion is not hard to upgrade to Lionheart Executioner. If your guild has cleared Karazhan and is starting upon SSC, you will have it in no time. About 3 Nether Vortex's dropped during clearing the trash mobs before Hydross The Unstable when I ran SSC with my guild for the first time. It might just be luck, can't really say. Of course, others will probably need the vortexes too, but 5 Vortex's aint bad for that awesome upgrade.

Comment by Sunstealer

In all honesty.... This is the best reason to go sword spec. Yes it's lvl 60. and yes it's Alliance (lol) but it's still an amazing pvp video. And as far as i remember, sword spec hasnt been changed since (still only procs off white hits for warriors). I may not know much, but i know that swords is the way to go. The sword may not come with stamina, but take a look at the massive dmg you can deal with this thing... It's worth it to me.

If you're doubting the sweet deal you get when you spec for swords, watch this... And put all your cares aside.

also i can activate Shadow Resistance Aura before attacking warlock or priest so i get more chance to resist there fears/spells .

so imo i think its maybe better from Stormherald coz it got the fear resist + i feel that Stormherald stun proc going to get nerfed coz there was alot of talk about it recently.

and about suggestion that says Stormherald Stun-proc can be used for Judgement of Command, imo Ret pallys always spam judgement when its available so they do more damage to the enemy , and the way i play paladin i dont think that iam gona w8 for the Stormherald stun proc so i cast my judgement, and if u gona w8 for the stun proc to happen any time so i think most of the time (if it wasnt all the time) your judgement will be on cooldown.

if any 1 can help by giving me more infos about increasing the fear resist will be appreciated.and sorry about my bad English :) thank you.

Comment by shrtbusbully

The fear break is decent for ret paladins but i think at this point it would be completely foolish for a warrior to spend the gold to craft this when he can just get the s2 sword for honor. Even for pve they are both about the same damage, and for pvp this thing has no stam at all or resilience which makes it pretty awful. If you're a sword pvp warrior i'd just wait and get the s2 merc sword for honor.

Comment by Sjukalua

What is the proc chance on the sword?

Comment by Tyrion133

this weapon would probably be the best for a Blood Elf Ret Pala to get cause of SoB, Alliance Pala's should get http://www.wowhead.com/?item=28442 because of the simple fact they only have SoC to have fun with

Comment by moosyodaddy

Not 100% sure this if this is the sword or the mongoose enchant, pretty sure its the sword, but whenever the sword is in motion, aka you're riding or swinging the sword it has a trailing stream of 3-4 rows of large orange spheres moving behind it. Whenever trailing people who have mongoose on other weapons, I have not noticed this, I got the sword enchanted immediately upon crafting, so I did not notice this before, and you need to have your "Spell Effects" option maxed to see it, and no I am not referring to the orange swords glow from mongoose, as this effect occurs anytime the sword is in motion, looks pretty cool, I uploaded a screenshot so you could see which shows it trailing behind the sword while its pulled back and hits an npc, I did have some riding shots, but the spheres are very faint and hard to capture with screen capture, unless you took a movie and pulled out the exact frame.

I also uploaded a screenshot of the proc animation (swirling small red bubbles above your head) as well.

Comment by Arbitration

SHORT SUMMARY: For those of you who don't feel like reading, Stormherald will do more damage per hit by a small margin, but Lionheart's proc, when averaged over time, might add a little more damage.

I'm not completely sure Ret should automatically go for Stormherald in PvE for raids.

The arguments for Stormherald are:

Slower weapon speed means higher average damage, thereby buffing both Seal of Command and Crusader Strike, which are both based on weapon damage.

The stun proc will cause Judgment of Command to hit harder.

Lionheart's advantages:

The stats give 20 more AP and slightly more crit.

Fear resistance. Mostly useless for raid DPS, but I'm mentioning it just so it isn't left out.

The proc adds 200 AP for 10 seconds.

Base weapon DPS calcs:

Lionheart's hits average 459 damage, Stormherald's average 482.5. Difference: 23.5, Stormherald deals 105.12% of Lionheart's damage. These are white hits, and since both weapons have their speed and damage average to 127 DPS, this calculation by itself is irrelevant. What is important here is that Stormherald deals 105.12% of Lionheart's damage, so all of the attacks the paladin uses that are based on weapon damage will do 5.12% more with Stormherald.

Judgment of Command does roughly twice its normal damage when the target is stunned, as well. These facts make Stormherald seem like the better DPS option for a Ret paladin. However, I have found several convincing counter-arguments.

Lionheart adds another 20 AP, which is roughly 1.43 DPS. The attack speed for Lionheart is 3.6, meaning you multiply the damage per second by number of seconds (1.43*3.6) to get the damage per hit (DPH). That comes out to 5.15 more DPH from stats than Stormherald. Since the 20 AP I calculated was just the advantage of Lionheart over Stormherald and not the total, I can just add it to the average DPH I already had for Lionheart without skewing the innate DPH difference between the two from speed. That means Lionheart comparatively has 464.15 DPH where Stormherald would have 482.5, narrowing the difference from 5.12% to 3.9%. Remember, I'm talking about nothing more than the weapon's base DPH and AP here, both of which are scaled the same for white attacks as they are for SoC procs and Crusader Strike, so the previous calcs still apply. To get the total percent increase in damage from this, I would need to calculate the number of procs per minute of Seal of Command (which is PPM, so neither weapon would proc more often, favoring the slightly slower Stormherald, which is why most people would use it) which I honestly don't know, and the amount of times "per second" Crusader Strike is used (1/6), which figures out to a DPS increase of .1667%, I would estimate that with all of the calculations made so far, factoring in only melee attacks, SoC procs, and Crusader Strikes, total damage would go up around 1%, or probably a bit lower. That's actually a few points of DPS, and not negligible, which means Stormherald still has the advantage thus far.

However, Lionheart also has a proc that adds 100 Strength, which is 200 AP unbuffed, or 220 with BoK. Depending on proc rate, adding 200 AP (or 220) every 30 seconds, or every minute, or every minute and a half, etc. could very well increase DPS beyond Stormherald's fairly small advantage. Remember, 200 AP applies to all of the Paladin's white hits, SoC procs, and Crusader Strikes just like Stormherald's base DPH advantage does. The only question is whether or not the proc's bursts of a lot of extra damage would average out to more than the consistent but very small advantage of Stormherald's DPH.* Having seen procs such as Crusader, Destiny, and Rage of the Unraveller on several characters, I have a hunch that the Lionheart proc would outdo the Stormherald's DPH.

*People also bring up the fact that JoC does more damage when the target is stunned, so this weapon also increases damage from JoC. I think this is generally a specious claim, since the proc rate on the stun, according to a Wowhead post, is about 1.4%, meaning that you would have to sit around with your Judgment already cooled down waiting for a proc to "capitalize" on the extra damage if you were using it in PvE, rather than using your Judgment as part of your normal rotation, thereby hitting much more often with it. Also, bosses are going to be immune to the stun effect, anyway, so it becomes worthless against them.

Frankly, it's a tossup. I am personally going to craft Lionheart Executioner for my Ret Paladin once I get him to 70, because I think it's probably a little better for PvE DPS, and the difference is probably so small that if I'm wrong, it's not going to matter much. I realize that was a very long post to read, but I didn't think it would get quite that long.

Comment by RazerMuffin

I wonder if Blizz would make another version of the Lionheart to couple with Season 4's release. Or they might just let it alone and people would only use this until their team gets good enough so they can use the spatula sword.

Comment by Mayhew

Comment by spweasel

I feel obligated to say it...

Thundercats, Ho!

Comment by Ixvang

OK, I want to know.

I'm currently using the S2 greatsword, and my blacksmitthing is starting to near 375. Should I keep the sword I'm using now, or should I spend the obscene amounts of gold to get the mats for this sword? I'm mostly a PvE retribution pally, but I do BG's from time to time. What do you guys think?

Comment by Davz

Actually the sword specs beats out Axe by a significant margin.1. Your crit dmg is reduced by resilience2. Sword spec proc can occur off any hit, even a Hamstring. How'd you like to Hamstring into a sword proc crit? Ouch.3. Sword spec proc can also trigger your sword's enchant proc: Mongoose, Executioner, Crusader, etc.

I found this out the hard way. I went from a ~70 DPS sword (Blade of Misforune) to a 93 DPS polearm (Terokk's Quill), respecced, and I did not get the 33% total damage increase I was hoping for. (My skills were about equal) MY DPS did go up, but only by about half what I was expecting. I know some other factors include the lack of Str/AP on the weapon, etc. But sword spec is just plain unbeatable.(68 War, btw)

Comment by hondapower

For those new to 2-handers, like I was when I started my Death Knight a few days after the x-pack launch, this sword is by far capable of taking you all the way from the time you're able to use it to level 80. You may lose a few dps over using some items attainable after level 75 or so, but the stats and proc on this weapon, coupled with its above-average dps will more than make up for it.

I might add that you need to be prepared to spend quite a bit of gold getting your Blacksmithing up high enough to use this weapon, I chose to do Mining along with it and that helped save quite a chunk of change. All said and done with, getting my Blacksmithing to 375+ and acquiring the mats to make this sword was around the neighborhood of 3-4000g. The prices on the mats to make this sword have plummeted, at least on Azgalor, so don't let the average Buyout prices wowhead still claims scare you away from making this weapon.

With Rune of the Fallen Crusader applied to this weapon at level 70 you can't go wrong. Servers are down for maintenance at the moment, but I've been tracking kills with Recount for at least half a level now, so when I get the chance I'll edit this post and provide proc-rates for both. Quite often is all I can say about both of them without looking at the numbers.

Comment by theredviola

What would be a good upgrade for this in Northrend for a Ret Paladin?

Comment by Atma

It's worth noting that this weapon, is one of the best 2h swords available, post-Wotlk levels 70-78 for a DK.

As everyone knows, there's a scarce number of 2h swords available in Wotlk, and if you're like me, and you don't like to use axes/maces/spears, you will want to use a nice sword instead (after all, a DK's weapon SHOULD be a sword, "runeblade" if you may, lore-wise heh).

Let's look at the choices we have (this might apply to Ret. Pallys/Warriors etc... But I'm strictly looking at this from a Blood DK point of view).

Add to that the fact that most people are selling the mats for this dirt-cheap (Vortexes, Primal Mights etc...) and if you happen to be a Blacksmith, this would be a no-brainer, since it will last you from 70-78, hell even to 80.

I'm not going to even mention other swords like Cataclysm's Edge or Apolyon, because of obvious reasons.

Not to mention it looks bad ass, and you don't see any other DK's wearing this bad boy ;)

Comment by UberTomm

Interesting stats. :]

Comment by killintyme

I'd give my left and right *** to have blizzard add another level to this beauty of a sword...i farmed mats and saved gold forever to make this for my dps warrior and now it just sits in my bank collecting dust because i refuse to sell or destroy it :-(

Comment by AnrDaemon

I see there's no comments referencing the Death Knight from tanking standpoint.So, here's my thought: if you're Death Knight, and Blacksmithing was (is) your profession of choice, this weapon is likely the BEST OF BEST possible two-hand tanking option available at level 70. Wouldn't be so easy to obtain, but if you have means of grinding TBC heroics or have enough gold to purchase mats (if i'm not mistaken, they are all tradable mats), of 3 weapon specializations, sword gives best stats, and it's +100 STR proc topping your tank even more.Put a good rune on it and have two chances of proc for the same swing.You could argue for it's speed for tanking, but, most of the time you are using skills, and one real option for a "white" damage is Rune Strike. Put it on a macro with frost strike or similar ability and forget about it.Here's how I did it for me:#showtooltip Frost Strike/cast Deathchill/cast !Rune Strike/cast Frost Strike

However, it is no longer craftable... *sigh* even if you had the plans back in TBC/Wrath, they were removed, when <weapon> mastery was taken out...

Comment by Escutcheon

I still have this in the bank, and on occassion I will break it out with the old school Gladiator's gear and run around like a living relic for awhile.For sure the most awesome Weapon I've ever owned, and toward the end of BC it was not uncommon to be on top damage and highest KBs dealt.I sure do love my Executioner.

Comment by Toragen

Comment by Eleanos

It would appear they were removed when Cataclysm came out, since they removed blacksmithing specs.

Comment by Gulanga

This thing must be quite rare now.

I remember making this back when I had not bought WotLK yet and was stuck at lvl 70 in Outland for a month.A very proud moment.

And I used it up until I found a better one in WotLK at like level 77 or something. Holds a special place in my bank.

Comment by keyalust

Does this Weapon still exist in Cataclysm? I'm making a lvl 70 twink prot/arms warrior and I want to know if i can still get this wep or any of the other weps that required to be spec'd into a special tree of BS.

Comment by linkhyrule

WOOT in 4.3 I can finally make my swords look like Lionheart ^^

Comment by Maelchav

With transmogrification coming soon, I've been wondering - is there a one-handed sword with a similar model? My paladin is a blacksmith and I made this sword a long time ago, but I never use it because I tank in PvE and heal in PvP. I'd love to 'mog my tanking sword to look something like this if I could, but haven't seen anything along these lines. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Comment by Frez

Looks like this sword's model is making a comeback in the new Scarlet Monastery.

Comment by VindicoSolus

Back when Wrath of the Lich King came out (2008), the pattern to make this item (along with many other patterns) were removed from the game as intended by the Developers.

This is not a bug. These patterns were removed intentionally.

If it were an accident, don't ya think that in the past 4 years that they would've added the items back? If you feel that I am wrong, show me an official post by the blues on their website stating otherwise.

Comment by Kyeld

took me the better part of a day to farm the mats for this at level 90, after digging out my old blacksmith alt who'd been gathering dust.

alternatively, check the AH. personally, I found it to be hit-or-miss (nether vortexes and primal nethers were dirt cheap; primal airs and manas were extremely expensive)

Comment by Aquifel

New from 5.2 PTR Patch notes! The legacy weapons Blizzard said Blacksmiths could craft at the 5.2 Lightning Forge are in! They're versions of old BC Weaponsmith items.This is one of the ones available :D. For a complete list of items available, along with more info on how to craft the new versions, check Lightning Steel Ingot.

Comment by Stok3d

The recipe for this item can now be discovered when creating the the daily BS cooldown ofLightning Steel Ingot. Below are the others introduced in this manner.

Patch 5.2 has a lot of serious raid content, but there's also some vanity items being added to professions. Blacksmiths get to craft replica versions of all those distinctive (and sadly removed) Burning Crusade weapons, while Engineers can make a new mount and pet!

Comment by Myebika

Bears a striking resemblance to the dagger worf wants to use to kill himself in star trek next generation season 5 episode 16: ethics. At 30:40 he holds the blade in front of his son and you can clearly see how similar both blades look.

Comment by AnrDaemon

As of today, the crafting spells for BC specialty blacksmithing weapons are back into one's crafting book (if you knew it in first place, and never unlearned the profession or specialization), but all the weapon remains Bind on Pickup, therefore only really useful for personal transmog.